The Cleveland Browns and Los Angeles Chargers do battle Sunday in a week 5 NFL game from FirstEnergy Stadium.
The Los Angeles Chargers will try to pick up some steam after improving to 2-2 on the year with a 34-24 win over the Texans in their last game. Justin Herbert has thrown for 1,250 yards, 9 touchdowns and a pair of interceptions on 66.9% passing while Austin Ekeler has a team-high 140 rushing yards this season. Mike Williams leads the Chargers in receiving with 258 receiving yards and a pair of scores while Gerald Everett has 211 receiving yards with a pair of touchdowns. Three other Chargers have at least 100 receiving yards as well this season. On defense, Drue Tranquill has a team-high 35 total tackles while Khalil Mack has a team-high 5 sacks and Bryce Callahan has a pair of INTs so far this season.
The Cleveland Browns will try to find some consistency after alternating wins and losses in each of their last four games following a 23-20 loss to the Atlanta Falcons last time out. Jacoby Brissett has thrown for 830 yards, 4 touchdowns and 2 interceptions on 64.6% passing while Nick Chubb has a team-high 459 rushing yards with 5 touchdowns and Kareem Hunt also has 200 rushing yards as well this season. Amari Cooper has a team-high 228 receiving yards coming on 20 catches with a pair of touchdowns while David Njoku has 201 receiving yards and Donovan Peoples-Jones has 141 receiving yards as well on the year. On defense, John Johnson III has a team-high 23 total tackles while Myles Garrett has 3 sacks but will still miss a significant amount of time due to injury.
Los Angeles is 5-1 ATS in their last 6 week 5 matchups and 7-2-1 ATS in their last 10 October games while the over is 8-2 in their last 10 games overall. Cleveland is 2-5 ATS in their last 7 games overall and 2-6 ATS in their last 8 games against the AFC.
I get the case here to be made for either side, but I’m still leaning towards the Chargers. I’ll give the Browns credit for sitting at .500 as I wasn’t overly confident in their QB situation, but I still think more highly of Justin Herbert and the Chargers as a whole than the Browns, especially with no Myles Garrett to cause havoc up front. I don’t expect this to be a flashy win by any stretch, but laying less than a field goal, I have to side with L.A. in this one.